I^ 1I IIIWI^1 A^AIYhh1Ih1IIIL1H

L1^VIY1UII1hlILI
SONG Weigang, SHANG Wenjie, LI Xiaosen
Mechanical Engineering &Automation School of Northeaster University, Shenyang 110004, China
Kcy w0rds: conveyor belt splice; fnite element;
Mooney-Rivlin model
Abstract: Steel cord conveyor belt splices are connected
by vulcanization. The splices are the weakest part of the
conveyor. Taking type ST1250 conveyor belt splice as an
example, fnite element sofware ANSYS is used to establish
the necessary model, dealing with the steel cord as elastic
components and the rubber as hyper-elastic Mooney-Rivlin
model. The APDL language in AYSYS is used to develop a
calculation program. Afer analysis, the conclusion was
drawn that the conveyor's vertical tension must be
transferred through the shearing stress between the rubber in
the splices zoom and wire rope, and the distances between
the wire rope must be wide enough to ameliorate the stress
condition of rubber. For the high-strength belts, due to the
high density, only by increasing steps can meet this
requirement.
Introduction
Belt conveyor is one of the most important modem bulk
solid handling equipment, which is widely used in coal,
electric power, metallurgy, construction materials, port and
other industrial felds. With the rapid development of
modem industry, belt conveyor is developing in the aspects
of high speed, high power, long-distance and large conveyor.
The crucial point of the belt conveyor design are the driving
power and the determination of the belt intensity, and the
key factor which impact the belt's strength is belt splice
strength. In spite that in domestic applications of the steel
cord conveyor belt, the tensile strength has achieved ST6300,
but due to lack of theoretical research and practical
experience in projects, a larger safety factor is used to ensure
the reliability of equipments. In the actual design, usually
choose 7 to 9 as safety factor, which results in excessive
investment in equipment. It can be seen that improving the
quality of splices is an important way to ensure reliable
operation of belt conveyor and reduce equipment
investment.
Researches on steel cord conveyor belt splices are mainly
focused on ftting process and engineering practice, while
theoretical studies are relatively few. Flebbe
[
l) introduced the
University of Hannover's fatigue strength test system and
method of steel cord conveyor belt splice, put forward the
concept of dynamic safety factor, and pointed out that using
dynamic safety factor method afer getting the splice
strength by test to choose belt type shows a better economy.
Hager and Wroge
(2
) adopt shearing fnite element model
between rubber and steel cord which was advanced by
Oehmen
(
3), to develop special program for splice design;
LI cororation of the United States has developed a 3-D
fnite element model
(4)[5)
, including wire rope model,
nonlinear isotropic hyper-elastic rubber model, use
ANSYS software to calculate the result, the above two
methods are the proprietary technology of research
institutions, in the literature does not detail. uHhO|mC|O,
Adams
[6]
under the condition that take rubber as
incompressible and non-linear material analysis the splice
use FEA.
Current theoretical research of belt conveyor splice is still
in its infancy. This paper will establish a model of all
parts of belt conveyor steel cord splice, including wire
rope, flled rubber, as well as the overall model, taking
the wire rope as the elastic components and rubber as
super-elastic components to deal with, highlighting the
characteristics of the composite material. In order to
facilitate the research on the impact of the parameters,
APDL language in ANSYS is used to develop a
calculation program.
Z Characteristic parameters of steel cord
conveyor belt splice
The wire rope of steel cord conveyor belt splice region can
not be directly connected. Therefore, splice region transmits
draft load through the shear stress between rubber and wire
rope. Main infuencing factor of the splice dynamic fatigue
strength include: structure of the splice, elongation of the
wire rope, rubber characteristics, load on belt conveyor etc.
Fig.1.a is the structure sketches of a three-step splice, Fig.1.b
is main parameters of the splice. Where: u -wire rope
diameter; l-wire rope spacing in belt; _ -minimum distance
of the rubber in splice, that is wire rope gap; L -length of one
step; S -butt gap between two wire ropes; LB -length of
wire rope enter the splice bending region; LS -length of
splice.
In accordance with DIN 22129.4
(
7
) standard about steel cord
belt conveyor, the values of steps and minimum length J of
vulcanized splices can be chosen in Table 1. However,
theoretical calculation and feld conditions etc. should also
be considered to determine those values.
18b61 Nnmum r6Cumm6nd6d 6nglh uCunV6yur b6l 8gC6
Bclt Typc Splice s teps
Min s plicc length
L,!m
ST630 I 0.55
ST800 I 0.60
STIOOO I 0.60
STl250 I 0.65
STl600 2 1.05
ST2000 2 1.15
ST2500 2 1.35
ST3150 2 1.65
ST3500 3 2.35
ST4000 3 2.65
ST4500 3 2.80
ST5000 4 4.05
ST5400 4 4.45
(a) Structure sketches of 3-step splice
L
L L L !
S
'
.
9

'

J1 .
(b)
Fig.l.
Main parameters of splice
Splice of a steel cord conveyor belt
Construction of splice model
.1 1ransmss0n 0l lracl0n l0rcc 0n lhc splccs
When conveyor system is in normal operation, axial force on
it is totally sufered by the paralleled wire rope. However, in
direction loads are taken to establish rubber and wire rope
solid model.
2
the joint part of the conveyor belt, because the wire ropes are
not connected together, the axial force of the conveyor will
be transmitted by the shearing force between the rubber in
splices and the wire rope. The tensile stress of the wire rope
can be considered as the result of a succession of shearing
force acting on its surface. In Fig.2, shearing force can be
used to describe the friction force transmitted between
different wire ropes. If the forces acted on two adjacent
unloaded wire ropes lying in the rubber are in different
directions, the rubber will perform shear deformation, with
the largest shear angle in the nearest region of the two wire
ropes.
After loading on the wire ropes, they will elongate along
different directions. Elongation in axial direction is not
constant value. Deformation descends fom the largest stress
point to the small stress point. The shearing stress of the
rubber also changes along axial direction. In the region of
relatively large displacement, the shear angle is the largest.
The largest shear angle occurs on the two ends, while the
value in the center is the smallest.
eIo,altciiotcotJtmdci|oad
shc.aJcleunat:on
Fig.2. Defonation of rubber in the spacing between cords
.Z L0nslrucl0n 0l nlc clcmcnl m0dcl
.Z.1 50ld m0dcl
Choose the relevant parameters of type STl2S0 conveyor
belt to create a model, its parameters including: axial tensile
strength is 12S0N/mm, wire rope maximum diameter is
4.Smm, spacing between wire ropes is 12 mm, belt thickness
is 17mm, top cover and pulley cover is 6m, conveyor belt
weight is 24.7kg/m
2
. As the model structure and the load is
symmetry, so only one half of the model was built for
analysis. 2 wire ropes of the type STl2S0 conveyor belt joint
region which are SOmm long and suffered different
.Z.Z 5clccl0n 0l clcmcnl lypc
SOLID45 is taken as wire rope element, which has plasticity,
creep, swelling, stress stifness, large deformation and large
strain properties. SOLIDl85 is taken as rubber element,
which has super-elasticity, stress stiffness, creep, large
deformation and large strain properties. Element SOLID185
can easily achieve the 2 parameters Mooney-Rivlin model.
.Z. L0nlacl arca 0l lhc wrc r0pc and rubbcr
The strength of steel cord conveyor belt splice mainly
depends on the adhesion force between the wire rope and
rubber. The adhesion force is usually given by the pull out
force, that is, the force to pull out unit length steel cord
which is stick into the rubber. The strength of steel cord
conveyor belt splice should meet the condition that the pull
out force is larger than the fracture force of the wire rope. In
this case, the wire rope will not be pulled out of the rubber
even if it is fracture. The KYOPT(l2) of the contact
element is 5, which is fastened contact mode, with contact
integral point in the sphere region in the initial and when
contacted it is fastened to the target face along the normal
and tangential directions. To sum up, the contact elements
formed are as Fig.3.
Fig.3. Elements of contact pair
.Z.+ mp0scd l0ad
P
Impose the load on the element nodes. Tension suffered by
the conveyor belt is much greater than its gravity, so the load
is imposed neglect of its gravity. Because of taking into
account the symmetry of the model, choose all the nodes on
XZ plane, using DSYM command to give symmetric
constraints. It can be seen from the model fgure the load
condition. Due to the complexity of the load, the DOF
constraints are imposed, and the rigid displacement of the
model is cancelled at the time. In normal operation, the
elongation of the steel cord conveyor belt is about 0.2%. So
when limit the elongation of one end, impose 0.3%
3
elongation on the other end. The model afer being imposed
load is shown in Fig. 4:
FigA. DOF constrain of model

+ Solution with W and results analysis

Model of the conveyor belt splice has large deformation and
non-linear contact state, so nonlinear options should be set.
Set time, automatic time stepping and load step option, then
use the SOLVE command to solve. Fig.5 shows the Von
Mises stress of the wire ropes and rubber. A program
developed with APDL to take the parameters that afect
results into account. The discussion of the results is as
below:
TII'"lOO
SEQV (AVG)
DH =.J..HE-03
STEP=l
SV =8
Tuzzoo
SEQV (AUG)
DM =.1.2-03
SmI "1225
3m "21413.
1229 48685
24957 72413


96141 143597 191053
119869 167325 214781
Fig.5. Von Mises stress diagram of steel cord and rubber
All the parameters used in the model are the diameter of
wire rope d, wire rope spacing g, and the thickness of
conveyor belt h, the length selected in the model /. Through
the analysis, the force of the rubber in the top and pulley
cover adhesive region is smaller than that in the core region;
h and / affect the rubber little; and at the same time this case
is the analysis of one kind of conveyor belt, then the d value
is constant.
Keep the other parameters unchanged and make the spacing
of wire ropes change from O.Olm to 0.03m with the 0.002m
intervals , at the same time without losing the generality,
increase the load to make the elongation from 0.1 % to 0.4%
with the step 0.001, then calculate these 11 different values
respectively. Table 2 lists the Von Mises stress value by the
changing the spacing of wire ropes under different loads.
Figure 6 shows the curve of Von Mises stress at different
load conditions with increase of the steel wire rope spacing.
It is obviously that in the same load condition, the equivalent
stress at the nodes decreases as width of g increasing. It
makes the improvement of the force condition of rubber
possible; the method is to make spacing of wire ropes big
enough to reduce the stress of rubber.
18b6 N8u68 uNunN868 8lr688und6r6nlu8d8
g/mm
Stcssl/(MPa)
Stcss2/(MPa)
Stcss3/(MPa)
Stcss4/(MPa)
0.Z
1.0 1.2
0.13893 0.10319
0.27132 0.22191
0.43618 0.37108
0.63664 0.53877
. . . .
I '
. . . . . .. . ... .. .....
!

....,.........

....
. . . .
. . . . .
C

`

, , , . . .
g

.. . . . . . .. - -- """
`
.
`
.
`

.
`
...
``` `
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``
....H .....
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. : . . : :
5
. . .
_

ct!
1 .Z .4
1.4
0.10397
0.21209
0.35095
0.51067

Fig.6. Von Mises stress curve change with wire rope spacing
on diferent loads
From Fig.6 it can be intuitively seen that the node's
equivalent stress always decreases with _ increasing and
changes more obviously when _ is before the value of
0.Ol8m. When _ is greater than 0.Ol8m the change
becomes smoothly, that is, when the distance between the
wire ropes is greater than 0.Ol8m it is of little helpful for
improving the load condition of the rubber, so it is
meaningless to continue to increase the width of the wire
ropes. And by the effects of the width of conveyor belt, the
rubber should be lef wide enough to achieve protective
effect, but it is impossible to make spacing between wire
ropes greater.
Fig.7 is the Von Mises stress curves when u is given
4
1.6 1.8 2.0 2.2 2.4
0.068108 0.036749 0.037487 0.038177 0.035711
0.17252 0.11108 0.10956 0.10963 0.10375
0.29927 0.21777 0.21035 0.20744 0.19636
0.43799 0.34124 0.32583 0.31890 0.30008
different values. As can be seen fom the fgure, Von Mises
stress in the rubber decreases as the spacing between wire
ropes increasing, and the reduction trend of the stress slows
down along the direction of _ increasing. By comparing,
with the diameter of the wire ropes increasing, this slowing
down trend point moves to the direction of _ increasing.
We can see that in the production of connectors, the width of
the rubber between the wire ropes should be greater than a
certain value, in order to ensure a more satisfactory load
state of the rubber avoiding fatigue failure of the rubber
under too large stress. So the use of high-strength conveyor
belt in the form of multi-step connections is required. It
accords with the empirical formula of the minimum value of
the rubber width between wire ropes given by Nordell and
others, that is
[
51
:
g=0.10xd+1.5 ( 1)
where: u wire rope diameter.
With the vertical tensile strength of the conveyor belt
increasing, the diameter of wire ropes also increases
correspondingly. However, the spacing between wire ropes
are getting smaller, that is, the density of steel wire ropes is
increasing. So if a certain width of rubber between the wire
ropes is necessary, the width of the splices region is greater
than the non-connected region of the conveyor belt, which is
not allowed. This problem will be solved well using stepping
form on the splices. As with the steps of the splices
mcreasmg, the number of splices in the WIre ropes will
decrease correspondingly. So as a result of a reduction of the
number of wire ropes, we can insure sufcient width of
rubber.
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5
(d) u =9.lmm
Fig.7 Under different diameter wire rope with WIre rope
spacing changes Von Mises stress curves
b Discussion on the division of splice steps
It is known by calculation: the number of wire rope in
one-step splice region is 100% more than it in conveyor belt;
in two-step splice region 50% more; in three-step splice
region 33.3% more.
Take one belt, the width of which is 2000mm. Suppose its
width is B, the number of wire rope is n the diameter of
wire rope is J the width of rubber between wire ropes is
_ in splice region.
When the splice type IS one-step, the splice width of
conveyor belt is:
B= 2nJ+{2nI)_+2a ( 2)
where: adistance between the most lateral wire rope
and the edge of conveyor belt.
Thus:
2
^
Z!
( 3)
When the type of conveyor belt is ST 1000, H =159,
u =4.0, it is known by calculation that the value of _ must
less than 2.3mm, meanwhile, according to the formula (1), it
is known that the minimum value of _ is 1.9mm. So the
splice of conveyor belt S T 1 000 can take one-step splice.
When the type of conveyor belt is ST 1250, H =159,
u =4.5, it is known by calculation that the value of _ must
less than 1.8mm, meanwhile, according to the formula (1), it
is known that the minimum value of _ is 2.49mm. So the
splice of conveyor belt STl250 cannot take one-step splice,
but instead, it should be considered another splice type, the
step of which is higher.
When the splice type IS two-step, the splice width of
conveyor belt is:
Thus:
B= l5nJ+{I5nI)_+2a
B-5nJ
_

I5n-1
(4)
{5)
Recalculate conveyor belt STl250, at the moment, _ must
less than 3.9mm, it meets the requirement of formula (1). It
is known by calculation that conveyor belt STl600, STl200
and STl250 meet the design requirement of the two-step
splice, so they can take the two-step splice. When the type of
conveyor belt is ST 3150, according to the formula {5) it is
known that
^
must less than 2.33mm, according to the
formula (1), the minimum value of _ is 2.3lmm. At the
moment, the distance between the most lateral wire rope and
the edge of conveyor belt is 1.8mm. The rubber at the edge
of conveyor belt is too little, and it is unfavorable for the
production of splice and the safe operation of conveyor belt,
therefore it should take the three-step splice.
When the splice type is three-step, the splice width of
conveyor belt is:
Thus:
B = 1.333nd +(l.333n -l)g +2a
B-1.333nd
g
< --
1.333n -1
( 6)
(
7
)
Recalculate conveyor belt ST3150, at the moment, _ must
less than 3.2mm, it meets the design requirement of the
three-step splice. It is known by calculation that conveyor
belt ST4000, ST4500 and ST50000 also meet the design
requirement, so they can take the three-step splice. From this,
it can be seen that the splice type is related to the value of
l/ u , with the decrease of the value of l/ u , the splice
type changes fom one-step to thee-step. So, when the type
of conveyor belt is ST 5000 or higher strength, because the
value of l/ u is decreasing, it should take the four-step
splice.
b Conclusion
This paper analysis steel cord conveyor belt splice with
ANSYS fnite element software to obtain the factors that
affect the splices strength and then discusses the best form of
connection. The major conclusions as following:
(1) On the discussion of the distance between wire ropes in
the splice, we conclude that the distance should be big
enough, to improve the rubber in which the force. For the
high-strength conveyor belt, the only way to meet this
requirement is to increase the steps of the splice to reduce
the quantity of the wire rope. The higher the tensile strength
of the belt, the more steps of the splice.
(2) In multi-step splices, the distance between connection
surface of wire ropes effects the stress of the rubber between
them. The greater the distance, the smaller the stress value,
but this decrease becomes less obvious when the distance
between the surfaces is more than 50mm.
6
(3) The length of each step of the splices and the stress of
rubber also have similar relationship, so we can increase the
length of the step to reduce the stress of the rubber. But the
length of wire rope is limited by its fracture force, so it is not
unlimited increase in the length of splices to increase their
strength.
Acknowledgements
This project is supported by National Natural Science
Foundation of China (Grant No. 50775031).
References
[1 ]H. Flebbe. Dynamic splice strength-Design criterion
for conveyor belts[1]. Bulk Solids Handling, 1988,8(5):
581-585
[2]M.Hager,H.von der Wroge. Design of Steel Cord
Conveyor Belt Splices[J].Bulk Solids Handing, 1991, 11(4):
849-860.
[3]Klaus Heiner Oehmen. Zur Berechnung zusatalicher
Dehnungen in Stahlseigurten infolge Kurvenfhungen und
Muldungsuberggangen[J],Braunkohle, 1977(6): 235246
[4]L.Nordell,X.Qiu,VSethi. Belt Conveyor Steel Cord
Splice Analysis Using Finite Element Methods [J].Bulk
Solid Handling, 1991, 11(4): 863-868.
[5]L.Nordell. Steel Cord Belt and Splice Construction[J].
Bulk Solids Handing, 1993, 13(1): 685-694.
[6]A. D. Adams. FEA of steel cable conveyor belt splices
[1], Rubber World, 1994, 41(9): 524-529.
[7]DIN22129 Teil 4-1991. Steel cord conveyor belts use in
underground coal mmmg; belt joints; dimension,
requirements: Beuth Verlag 1991.